Apparatus for inserting pins into a printed circuit board or the like are known, for example, in Reggi U.S. Pat. No. 3,939,542, among others. The pins for a printed circuit board can serve as terminals for the various connections of the printed circuitry on the board. The pins must of course be very carefully positioned on the board, so that good electrical contact is made in all cases.
It is a desirable feature of pin driving equipment for a printed circuit board or the like to have the capability of driving a pin quickly into any selected location on the printed circuit board, between other components which have been previously assembled or otherwise applied to the board. This avoids the often less desirable step of driving the pins before other components are mounted on the board in the assembly process.
Also, it is desired to mount the printed circuit board on a horizontal table, particularly an X-Y table which an automatically move to various horizontal positions along both an X and Y axis, for precise and automatic positioning in of the printed circuit board under the pin-driving apparatus.
It is desirable to use a pin magazine in which each pin can be removed from the magazine in a horizontal position, and then moved to a vertical position in transverse relation to the table and the printed circuit board for driving.
The above desired features are accomplished in this present invention, to provide improved flexibility of operation and facilitated manufacturing techniques for the assembly of printed circuit board or other precision devices into which pins are mounted.